On Friday night we saw Lily perform a charming play after her month of theatre camp. She played a slutty demon.

After the show I met the parents of a 12-year-old gay kid who was easily the star of the show. He is obsessed with fashion. Begging his mother to take him look at wedding dresses in Beverly Hills.

I smiled, remembering my own fashion obsessions when I was his age.

He is not having a great time at school. The other kids are mean to him and he in turn is a pain in the ass. I know that feeling too, being an obviously gay kid who spent the larger part of his childhood at war with other kids.

I rather hoped I would grow out of it but…I didn’t. I am still at war.

The entire weekend was spent rehearsing and shooting tests for the movie. I look forward to viewing the material.

After day one we met Jacob and Fielder at Laurel Hardware. The dinner was spectacular.

We scoffed the heavenly pig cheek, sharing the lamb, the char, assorted salads and the most delicious rhubarb and strawberry cobbler and roasted peaches.

Perfection.

The ingredients are locally sourced, incredibly fresh and the flavor combinations were perfectly well judged.

After day two of rehearsing and shooting the most dramatic scene in the film… we all took off for the local watering hole.

Boys leaping a hundred foot out of the air into the ice-cold water.

Policeman confiscating beer and … of all things… an axe. A mostly Mexican crowd they looked horrified when the cops turned up.

It was a piss poor, irritating day yesterday. Nothing, it seemed, was going to rescue me from the thankless groaning of harassing renters and the yearning I have to get home.. and quickly. I left my card in the ATM and have mislaid my beastly driving license.

All in all it was pretty ghastly until I went to therapy at 8pm where I sat with my peers and bathed in our shared misery. Suddenly I felt a whole heap better! There really isn’t anything more exhilarating than listening to those who have had a worse day than you.

Look, I could sit here and write about my financial woes. I could entertain you with the menopausal ranting of Irene from Hawaii or I could just let it go. The worse a person complains and harasses the less likely I am to deal with a situation. It’s just the way I am wired.

Many years ago I made a very bad film in Romania called The Method starring Elizabeth Hurley. It was not the best experience of my life (probably one I would rather forget) but it seems I am not going to be afforded that luxury.

The chaotic making of The Method has inspired the Producer of The Method to write and direct a film about the chaotic making of The Method. The premise is thinly disguised. I was prepared to be irritated but after having had a look at the trailer it all looks rather fun. Anyway, I am looking forward to seeing it and am sure that the press will come knocking once they realize that his film is based on our experience of creating what must be one of the worst films ever made.

It heartens me to think that out of strife and stress art can be made. I am not at all worried by how I may/may not be portrayed. I am merely flattered that the very enterprising director/writer moved a mountain to make a film based on our shared experience. We know how difficult that can be, don’t we?

Time passes and tightly held resentments lose their steam. Fruitless anger, the spirited defense of nothing worthwhile, all this ultimately becomes the secret joke we tell ourselves in later years.

There is June Gloom in LA which makes the light very English, all the colours in my house come alive when the sky is gray. Apart from our gray British skies I miss just how damned rude we can be. All these years of living in polite America! I am looking forward to the bawdiness of my country men. Rapier wit coupled with a good wank joke.

I love that we can both be extremely polite and totally vile within seconds.

The first book I ever bought with my own teenage money was the collected works of Hogarth. Bawdy.